84 DANCING Multicultural Theatre T HERE used to be only one place a nondancer could learn about dance-the theatre. Now there's the college classroom, too: at its best, a forum for the lively discussion of things seen and sensed in the theatre; at its worst, a refuge for theatrephobes and intellectual diddlers, and a source of Newspeak. The latest buzzword is "multiculturalism"-the term educa- tors have been using to define the vogue in curriculum reform. In dance circles, multiculturalism means the political advocacy of other than Western (or non-"Eurocentric") forms of dance. Those of us who are educated in the theatre may well wonder what there is to be political about. Multiculturalism exists and has always existed in Ameri- can dance; there is scarcely an Ameri- can choreographer of note who has not been influenced both by the pluralism of our society and by the way dance just naturally soaks it up. Pinning a label on a simple phenomenon like that is something only an academic would want to do. And only political academ- ics would want to isolate the elements of pluralism in such a way as to ag- grandize some and stigmatize others. The multiculturalists who cite re- cent trends in immigration have a case. There may be a need to promote the accessibility of Asian, Hispanic, and African dance companies, many of which lead a marginal life, with few bookings. But the dance forms them- selves are hardly inaccessible-they're part of every dance tradition the West knows. At their purest (assuming that one can find village and street festivals that are uninfected by television and tourism), they still speak a rhythmic language intelligible to all who love dance. To argue otherwise fits in with certain divisive notions of culture pop- ular in the universities; it also fits in with theories of curriculum reform. But the discussion of multicul- turalism among dance people has a peculiar urgency. What the academic partisans of Asian and Hispanic and African dance are really telling us is that ballet is in decline and the cre- ative impetus in modern dance has final- ly petered out; therefore, we'd better pay attention to these other styles or we have no dance to talk and write about. The key word is "other" (it's another buzzword); the assumption is that these styles lie outside the mainstream and are kept there by mainstream prej- udice. And what the pols want (and, given their weight in academic quar- ters, seem certain to get) is the creation of special-interest groups that need special- in terest, academically fostered insights in order to be understood. The Dance Critics Association, which often serves as an academic sounding board, has announced a con- ference devoted to "Critical Impera- tives in World Dance," to be held later this summer in Los Angeles. At the same time, the Los Angeles Festival will offer dance presentations consist- ing of-according to the D.C.A. flyer - "ensembles from the Pacific Islands, "Sir, all the junior executives Jozn me in thanking you for sending down the cookies." JULY 23, 1990 Asia, Australia, Central and South America, Mexico and Indonesia, as well as performances by distinguished American artists." Presumably, the fly- er means United States-based or United States-bred artists. In any case, one of the distinguished ones was scheduled to be Mark Morris, whose Brussels-based company has just completed its annual summer engagements in this country. Morris was dropped when the festival finances got too tight. Los Angeles will miss seeing what the festival could have taken pride in sponsoring as a genuine expression of world dance. The danc- ers Morris employs are of every color and physical description, and are cast without regard to race, rank, or sex. The choreography is a blend of styles Western and Eastern. Though it may not advertise itself this way, the com- pany is, in fact, a multicultural micro- cosm. I saw it in Boston, in Brooklyn, and at Jacob's Pillow. As a dance spec- tacle, it seemed to have matured over the past year. I was fascinated not only by its abundance and variety but by its elegant distillation, its emphasis on this world in this grain of sand. It was what every great dance company-ethnic, classical, or modern-has always been: a vision of the universe and the indi- vidual's place in it. Morris's company stresses the indi- vidual, though, in ways that other companies don't. Men and women make powerful impressions, but they hardly ever do so together, or in rela- tion to one another, or by themselves in relation to the group. Though partners exist in Morris's universe, their exis- tence is circumscribed and qualified by the group; they step out of a human panorama and fall back into it without asserting themselves for more than a few seconds as a unit. I'm describing a general tendency, not a hard-and-fast rule. But certainly none of the pieces I saw this summer included the pas de deux as a preferred form, even when the form could have been mandated by the subject, and even when it might have been given single-sex treatment. (That possibility existed, as it always does, on Morris's stage, but only as a possibility. ) In his version of Purcell's "Dido and Aeneas" (performed in Brooklyn at the Majestic Theatre), the lovers do not make love; the ceremonial nature of the proceedings all but precludes it, and anyway the more important duo is Dido and the Sorceress, both of whom are